Landing pad for 28mm

I must say that this project actually started for the AT-43 game, which even if officially dead and with questionable rules I still like. Unfortunately I do not have too much time to play now nor to design or build thing for it.
Usually I try to make things which are not very difficult to assemble and with the materials I find around me. As a friend of mine put it once while holding a piece or random plastic "imagine this painted in black..."
So, I am always looking to what I have at hand and trying to see how it would look once is out of context, glued to something else and painted frist, of course, in black and then in the new context.
In AT-43 there are some maps which include a landing pad of a spaceport and in the now disband AT-43 forum there was a nice 3D home made version which made me wonder about trying my own version.
In the mean time Dust Warfare was released and even if we still did not play it, the game sounds great and in the next expansion "Zverograd" they are going to introduce the SSU faction which will include some aircraft units, so a landing pad could also be a nice addition to the terrain elements for that game ;)
It happend I was having some picture frames still in their styrofoam (polystyrene) covers and some pieces of isolation for the floor (the one you put below the laminate or other "wooden" floor) which I cut to fit inside as you can see in the picture.

The thickness of the isolation piece just an exact fit for the height of the styrofoam cover which was a bit bigger than the thickness of the picture frame.
Once they are assembled, they look like that.

The styrofoam will be painted as concrete and the isolation piece as red-white landing signals. For this I just cut a template in piece of thick paper, actually part of a cardboard carton from a package of something for the household, nothing fancy. Obviously the colours of the template are inverted, I mean the white would be red in this case and the holes is where I intended to paint with white, but this picture represents more or less the final idea seen from above :)

 I painted in dark red the inside "corners" of the landing pad in the isolation piece.

And using the template I applied the white colour.

Probably I will need to retouch a bit the border of the white lines but I will wait until see how it looks once the styrofoam cover is painted and on top of this piece. And the part which is supposed to be like arrows pointing towards the centre does not look like I have it in mind but, we will see...

A different fairy tale...

A quite strange maybe bizzarre even movie we watched yesterday. In some respects it resembles the Dutch film "Sint" (Wiki, IMDB) wherein a traditional fairy tale or "story for kids" takes a more tenebrous aspect.
This one is a Finnish product, the land of the real Santa as the film proclames, which if weird in its story and narrative, not so really scary but actually funny. Soundtrack was in Finnish in our copy, so we have to read the English subtitles and learn a bit of Finnish in the process :)

Zero Tolerance

This blog was actually intended to deal only with hobbies and similar stuff, non with "real life" concerns (apart from the cooking recipes) but, sometimes, real life just makes you (even more) to be somewhere else (in time and space).
From a English language news source in the Netherlands (source)
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Problems with Poles? Report them to us, says new PVV website
 (Wednesday 08 February 2012)
Geert Wilders' anti-immigration PVV party has launched a new website where people can report complaints about central and eastern European immigrants in the Netherlands.
'Do you have problems with people from central and eastern Europe? Have you lost your job to a Pole, Bulgarian, Romanian or other eastern European? We want to know,' the website states.
The website is illustrated by newspaper headlines such as 'Wouldn't it be better if you went back?' and 'Eastern Europeans, increasingly criminal'.
Insight
PVV parliamentarian Ino van de Besselaar told the AD the aim of the site is to develop proper insight into the 'problems caused by central and eastern Europeans in terms of crime, alcoholism, drugs use, dumping household waste and prostitution'.
The results will be delivered to social affairs minister Henk Kamp. Questioned by Nos television, Kamp refused to condemn the PVV’s campaign, saying it is up to individual parties to decide what they do.
Discrimination
According to media reports, the Polish embassy in the Netherlands is 'not pleased' with the initiative. 'Insulting party initiatives do not contribute to calm discussion,' a spokesman is quoted as saying in the AD.
Last year, the Polish ambassador to the Netherlands Janusz Stanczyk said the attitude to people from eastern Europe 'borders on discrimination'.
Over the past year or so, local and national politicians have called for action to curb the 'tsunami' of Polish and other Eastern European workers in the Netherlands. Social affairs minister Henk Kamp even called for jobless Poles to be deported, even though this is impossible under EU rules.

(© DutchNews.nl)

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This is Europe today...

Easy Cheese Cake

Ingredients

400g Quark cheese

400ml milk cream

200g sugar

6 eggs

8 portions of The Laughing Cow cheese

1 pinch of salt (optional)

Preparation:

1.- Mix everything together

2.- Bake in pre-heated oven at 160°-180°C for about 45 min (until the centre is not fluid anymore)

3.- Cover with fruits marmalade

Doctor Who Experience

Great Experience !
Really, one of the best things to do in London those days.
The setting is everything you would have expected. The entrance to the show lies on the way of the TARDIS where you are received by the very enthusiastic crew. The waiting is not a big deal as some real size models of events in the Doctor Who universe are around to keep you busy.
One inside the show, you will see a short film before entering the crak in time and space and try to help the Doctor to escape out of the Pandorica.
The experience is really interactive since the very first moment as the Doctor is really talking to you, as part of the audience in your way through time and space, wherein and wherewhen you encounter several iconic moments of the story.
After the show, there are some exhibitions rooms, one dedicated to the Doctor, one to the Companions and one to the Adversaries (they call them Monsters, but I prefer the term adversary as more neutral :D )
In the room dedicated to the Doctor (depicted) you can see all the incarnations of the Doctor as well as read something about his character and mood under such incarnations.
The Companion's room shows all the past Companions of the Doctor as well as reproductions of the TARDIS and some footage from the old TV Series.
The Adversaries section can spoil you some of the more recent episodes (2011) as the accompanying text details the outcome of some episodes.
Here you will find also a projection room where you can watch some of the "how it was done" of the last season episodes.
At the end there is, of course, the shop where you can buy some nice merchandising, including DVDs and books.
A very thrilling experience for all the family.
Enjoy !

Apple?, Maybe not, thanks

Maybe I am unlucky with their products but so far Apple scores really low in my personal list of useful and reliable things.
First Apple device I got was an iPod Touch 32 GB. Nice thing, still working, no problems at all. 1 point for Apple.
Second product was the iPhone 3G, the same, still working, a bit slow nowadays with the last upgrade of the software but still functional. Another point for Apple.
Third item, a MacBook pro. Nice thing, quite fast at the beginning, quite slow now with the Snow Leopard last upgrade, but already once in the repair service. The Nvidia fatal error. Dead Nvidia graphic card. Luckily it was still on time to enjoy the extended warranty. Quite annoying that a product so expensive and not over used breaks after less than three years. Minus one point for Apple.
Fourth was the Apple TV. One of the worst things I have bought in my life. Continuous problems with the synchronization with the iTunes, specially after ANY update, either of the AppleTV or of the iTunes. Really hate the thing. Minus one point for Apple (actually it should be more minus points, but I try to kept this rating non-emotional).
Time Capsule was the fifth and the last Apple product I got so far. Very nice and useful toy, even if I was having some issues with the connectivity of mac and PC on the same wifi, however two weeks ago it decided to die. One day it was plugged but switched off. According to the apple forums, it seems to be a failure of the power source due to overheating. The problem is well-known and apparently solved in some Time Capsules, but not in others. This time the serial number of mine is not in the "lucky" range for the repair action. The thing was two years old. Again, quite annoying that something so expensive and which supposedly will keep my data safe as backup device, breaks suddenly without any warning nor apparent official repair options (according to the apple forums they usually offer you a discount in a new one and even AppleCare does not cover the Time Capsule). So, another minus point for Apple.
Total score: -1
Sorry Apple,

Breaking the Wall

AT-43 is officially dead but I am afraid a lot of people have their miniatures still around. I have :)
And I am also trying to learn how to build and paint some terrain for the game (or for other miniature games).
In this endeavour, I try to use anything, specially everything which comes into my hands. This time it was a piece of Styrofoam which was intended to protect the head of my printer during transport.
I gave a first layer of Payne's Grey mixed with some thickening medium and beach sand to obtain some texture and a dark background.
Afterwards, I highlighted it with some dry brush work with three different greys, and a bit of white mixed with the lighter of the greys.
Hope you like it.
Suggestions are welcomed.